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Back when I was covering Donald Trump's first presidency, it was incredibly common to read three different versions of the same story. His administration had split into several factions, all of which had different interests, and all of which hated each other. There was the Reince Pr …
MILAN — Switzerland’s decision not to participate in the European Union’s Copernicus Earth observation program during the 2028–2034 funding cycle has revived a broader debate over the value of contributing […]
The post Swiss decision to not contribute to Copernicus tests program’s value model appeared first on SpaceNews.
If United States policymakers deride the wider United Nations, they still spend on the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) because it amplifies the commercial reach of U.S. standards. This includes U.S. […]
The post A UN agency that works for US space appeared first on SpaceNews.
Anthropic was already navigating one dispute with the government in its standoff with the Pentagon, and then came an order on June 12th to block off foreign access to its most recently released AI models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5. When they launched on June 9th, Anthropic said “Fable 5’s capabilities exceed those of any model we’ve ever made generally available,” and that Claude Mythos 5 had the same underlying model, “but with the safeguards lifted in some areas.”
According to reports, the order came after conversations between Amazon and the White House about researchers saying they found ways to get Fable 5 to serve information that could be used in cyberattacks.
Anthropic responded by shutting access to both models for all customers, saying, “We are complying with the government’s legal directive and are removing access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5 for all users. However, we disagree that the finding of a narrow potential jailbreak should be cause for recalling a commercial model deployed to hundreds of millions of people.”
Read along below for all of the latest updates
For months, Big Tech's Washington lobbyists have chased after the holy grail of pro-AI legislation: preemption. This would be a comprehensive federal law, passed in Congress and signed by the president, applying one set of AI rules across the entire country and overriding the legally messy state-by-state approach to regulation. For months, lobbyists have run into roadblocks and incurred nationwide political blowback, and they now face the possibility that after the midterms, Congress will flip to hostile Democrats unwilling to work with them.
But their final, most desperate attempt at preemption is coming with new baggage, related to an ent …
From the day it was announced, on June 16th, 2025, the Trump phone sounded ridiculous. The T1 Phone 8002 (gold version), as it was officially called, was a combination of contradictory specs, product images that were clearly not photographs of a real phone, and the worrying requirement of a $100 deposit to secure a preorder of a $499 phone with no release date. But none of Trump Mobile's outlandish announcements were as bold as the claim that the phone would be "designed and built in the United States."
The US has next to no phone manufacturing infrastructure, few engineers with the required expertise, and little of the affordable, flexible …
The UK is the latest country to follow Australia in implementing a total social media ban for children under 16, Prime Minister Keir Starmer has announced. The ban, which could take effect from early next year, will be joined by wider measures that will also prevent children from talking to strangers in online games, livestreaming, or using sexual or romantic chatbots.
"Do we truly believe that social media creates a happy environment for our children? Do we truly believe that it's a place where they can feel safe?" Starmer asked during a press conference announcing the policy. "I don't think I even need to answer those questions, do I?"
" …
According to a new report from Semafor, the White House's decision to impose export restrictions on Anthropic's Mythos was driven in part by fears that it had been accessed by a group linked to China. If the Chinese government actually had access to Mythos 5 or Fable 5, it would present a serious national security risk. The government could also attempt to reverse engineer the model through distillation, a method in which a "student" AI is trained on a more advanced model to replicate its behavior.
The White House has not confirmed this report, and a post on X by Trump adviser David Sacks did not mention China. Instead, Sacks focused on a r …
According to the The Wall Street Journal, the export control directive that led to Anthropic cutting off access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5 was triggered in part by cybersecurity research from Amazon and conversations between CEO Andy Jassy and the White House. According to the report, the paper from Amazon claims that, through a series of prompts, it was able to get Fable 5 to serve up information that could be used in cyberattacks. Amazon has yet to respond to a request for comment.
Shortly after Jassy shared the company's findings with the government, it made the call to block its use by foreign nationals. Complicating this issue is that man …
On Friday evening, the government ordered Anthropic to block access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5 for all foreign nations, both inside and outside the US, due to national security concerns. That order included employees of Anthropic. To meet those demands, the company has completely cut off access to the models for all customers.
In a statement, Anthropic said that while it was complying with the order, the government "did not provide specific details of its national security concern." Instead, it claims that any evidence of potential jailbreak was provided verbally, and that the vulnerabilities discovered were minor and available via other model …
Founded during the US Civil War to provide advice to the government, the National Academies of Science have become one of the most prestigious scientific organizations. Its primary function is to prepare comprehensive reports on scientific and technological issues, aided by its ability to attract top talent from across the country.
Those reports have not been afraid to weigh in on matters of public controversy and risk offending powerful groups, which it has managed to do without losing the respect of the governmental organizations that fund these reports. But this year, there have been increasing signs that the Academies' ability to dodge political firestorms has reached its limit. Yesterday, a deeply reported story from Politico explained the breakdown between the National Academies and Republican politicians.
The National Academies is preparing an expert report on attribution of weather events to human-driven climate change, and fossil fuel companies are worried it will lead to findings of liability in the many cases where those companies are being sued.
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The committee's 2027 defense bill would eliminate separate statutory requirements for the two acquisition organizations while advancing broader Pentagon procurement reforms
The post Senate NDAA backs plan to fold SDA, Space RCO into Space Force appeared first on SpaceNews.
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